Ved Shala - The Observatory, Ujjain

Our trip to Ujjain was purely a temple tour, but I simply can’t imagine a visit to a place without going all over it, looking at interesting places and things. From all I had read about the city, the Kalideh Palace seemed an interesting place, situated on the banks of the Shipra at the site where once stood a sun temple. Unfortunately, our driver absolutely refused to take us to the palace, saying that there was nothing worth seeing there (this is certainly not true, from all that I have read of it, but he refused to budge). His refusal, coupled with a bit of unexpected delay at some other places led us to abandon the idea. The driver seemed to feel sorry for us, and as a sort of a bonus, took us to the observatory, which is called the Ved Shala.

The observatory at Ujjain was also built at the behest of Raja Jaisingh of Jaipur, the same man who was responsible for the observatories at Jaipur and Delhi. While I have not visited the one at Jaipur, I have visited the Jantar-Mantar at Delhi and have fond memories of visiting the place with my cousins and uncles. The observatory at Ujjain is not as grand as that one, but it is an interesting one, considering that Ujjain was the centre of Astronomy and astrology in ancient India. The Panchang or calendar in North India is based on the calculations made at Ujjain.

The observatory is something which has been much written about, so instead of going into details, I shall stick to my pics of the place with names of some of the yantras. Those of you who want to know more details, please check out the following link.

http://www.ujjain.nic.in/observatory/vedshala.htm

Look who's bearing the weight of the Earth on his tender shoulders..... a huge globe at the entrance.

Some of the Yantras..........

sorry, no pic of this one... seem to have missed it, running behind Samhith!

Samhith had a ball, scampering up and down!!!!

Recently, efforts have been made to decorate and maintain the place and make it interesting for the kids who visit... these are part of the developments.....

 

where there are flowers, there are butterflies......